Finchem wants hecklers handled better

MIAMI - Commissioner Tim Finchem believes the PGA Tour has a solid plan for handling hecklers. It just needs to be better executed.

So he wants tour officials, course marshals, tournament volunteers and even players to follow specified guidelines when dealing with outspoken spectators.

"I think this is a manageable problem, but this is something we've got to work on," Finchem said Wednesday, a day before the opening round of the Ford Championship at Doral.

Finchem said neither Davis Love III nor tour and tournament personnel properly handled a haranguing spectator during the final round of the Match Play Championship.

The commissioner and player spoke at length about the way Love confronted the gallery and demanded the heckler be taken away.

Finchem said players are supposed to respond to distracting situations by telling scorers, who forward the information to officials and then security personnel, if necessary. He said he didn't have a "big problem" with Love taking matters into his own hands, but only because tour officials failed to deal with the incident earlier.

"Davis makes it quite clear that if he had to do this over again, he would have gone to somebody," Finchem said. "If he had it to do over again, he wouldn't do it again. And I appreciate his attitude on that."

Love had a 1-up lead over Tiger Woods halfway through the 36-hole final at La Costa on Sunday when a man started needling him. Love didn't win another hole after that.

The man let out a "Whoop!" when Love missed a par putt on the 20th hole that squared the match. The fan started yelling "No Love!" as Love stepped to his ball on the fifth tee. Love sought out the spectator, saying he wouldn't continue to play until the fan was found.

A man wearing a Tiger Woods logo cap was identified as the heckler and tossed out.

Love defended his actions Tuesday, saying hecklers should be removed from the course. "The people who disagree with that, they don't understand the game," he said.

Love is not playing at Doral this week. But Finchem believes the highly publicized episode will help the PGA Tour be better prepared for anyone intentionally trying to distract players during the first tournament on the Florida Swing and in the future.

Some players, including Nick Price and Kenny Perry, aren't so certain. They expect the problem to increase as golf becomes increasingly popular and brings in more mainstream crowds that include spectators unaware of the importance of silence during shots.

"If it's not something that's nipped in the bud now, it's going to get worse and worse and worse as the years go on," Price said, recalling constant heckling problems for Colin Montgomerie and Sergio Garcia.

Said Perry: "We're getting a lot more football-style crowds out here. Golf used to be appreciated and it was all claps for everybody. Now it's gotten very vocal, very aggressive. It's just something that's going to get worse. You'll see it time and time again. It's something that won't go away."

Finchem said the tour might consider reducing fans' intimate access if problems with hecklers become more frequent.

"It's easy to foresee that," he said, adding that the option probably would be a last resort.